From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A view of Gilo from Beit Jala in the south. Note the anti-sniper walls on the outer buildings and the "Tunnels Highway" below.

Coordinates: 31°43′N, 35°11′E Gilo (Hebrew: גילֹה‎) is an Israeli Settlement located in the West Bank, South of Jerusalem established on land which has been occupied by the State of Israel since the 1967 Six-Day War.^[1][2][3] As of 2005, more than 27,000 Israeli's reside in the settlement, making it the third largest in the Occupied Territories.^[4][5] Gilo was named after a biblical Judean town whose name was preserved by the neighboring Bethlehem suburb of Beit Jala.

Gilo lies on Slaiyeb mountain in the southwest quadrant of Jerusalem. It is separated from the more urban downtown by a large, forested recreation area. To Gilo's south, a deep gorge lies between it and Beit Jala. The Tunnels Highway to Gush Etzion runs underneath it on the east, and the settlement of Har Gilo, which shares its name, is visible across the gorge on the adjacent peak. North of Gilo are the Jerusalem neighbourhoods of Beit Safafa and Manahat.

Some of Gilo's land was owned by Jewish institutions prior to the 1948 Arab-Israeli War,^[6] though more than 2,700 dunams of land used to build Gilo were confiscated by the Israeli government from the nearby Arab towns of Beit Jala, Beit Safafa and Sharafat, according to the Applied Research Institute - Jerusalem.^[7] Although Israeli Government considers it a neighborhood of East Jerusalem since annexing East Jerusalem into Israel in 1980, this move was almost instantly rejected by the International Community,^[8] and it is thus an Israeli settlement and Illegal under International Law.^{[9][10][11][12]} In 2001, following pressure from an Israeli advocacy group CNN issued a memorandum to its staff stating that "We refer to Gilo as a 'Jewish neighborhood on the outskirts of Jerusalem'... We don't refer to it as a settlement." This drew criticism from a number of Palestinians as well as some media watch groups.^[13]

Between 2000-2002, during the course of the Second Intifada, over 400 incidences of shooting from Beit Jala into Gilo took place. Though no residents were killed, some were seriously injured and there was much damage to property.

The mostly Palestinian Christian residents of Beit Jala reported that their homes were used against their will by Muslim militant groups, and believed that the strategy was designed to effect a demographic change in the area. They point to the Tanzim militants' choice of Christian Beit Jala to shoot from over other places where they could have similarly targeted Jerusalem, and their specific positioning in or near Christian homes, hotels and churches such as St. Nicholas, as well as institutions like the Greek Orthodox club, and their knowledge that a slight deviation in Israeli return fire would harm the Christian buildings.^[14]

Andreas Reinecke, head of the German Liaison office to the Palestinian Authority, protested:

I would like to draw your attention in this letter to a number of incidents which occurred at "Talitakoumi" school in Beit Jala...which is funded mainly by the Protestant Church in Berlin. Over the last few days the school staff noticed attempts on the part of several armed Palestinians to use the school premises and some of its gardens for their activities. If they succeed in doing this, an Israeli reaction will be inevitable. This will have a negative impact on the continuation of the functioning of the school, in which no less than 1,000 [Christian] Palestinians study....You cannot imagine the kind of upheaval which will be provoked among the supporters of this school [in Germany] should they discover that the school premises are used as a battle ground.^[15]

Eventually the Israeli Government bulletproofed the outer row of homes.^[16] The shooting on Gilo ceased completely only after Operation Defensive Shield.

• Positions on Jerusalem
• Beit Jala
• Har Gilo